


Briefcases and Brief Cases

by AlexIsNotHere



Category: Love Live! Sunshine!!
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-21
Updated: 2020-10-21
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:47:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27136121
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlexIsNotHere/pseuds/AlexIsNotHere
Summary: Mari Ohara runs late for a meeting.
Relationships: Kurosawa Dia/Ohara Mari
Comments: 7
Kudos: 22





	Briefcases and Brief Cases

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Asallia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Asallia/gifts).



> This fic was written to hyper pander to one specific friend so if you're reading this and you're not her consider yourself warned.

The atmosphere in the conference room was terse, and tersely silent. Riko and Dia sat at one end of the long table, while Chika sat alone at the other. None of them had spoken in some time, and the constant tick-tock, tick-tock of the clock mounted on the wall was the only sound filling the space, until Riko finally spoke up for the first time in minutes.

“Are you sure she’s-”

“She’ll be here,” Chika insisted, her expression remaining firm as she stared back across the table. Riko seemed unconvinced, while Dia just looked more irritated than anything.

“This is absurd,” she huffed. “She was supposed to be here twelve minutes ago. I have a very busy schedule, and if this is the level of professionalism I can expect throughout this entire process then I have half a mind to-” Before she was able to finish the thought, however, the conference room door came swinging open, and one Miss Mari Ohara came bursting into the space with an aura of chaos that immediately disrupted the otherwise quiet, pristine setting.

“Sorry I’m late, sorry, sorry!” she hummed out, swinging her briefcase up onto the table just next to where Chika was sitting. “You wouldn’t believe how bad traffic was on the way over here. _Someone_ decided to run a red light and nearly t-boned another driver, and let me tell you, the cops had _quite_ a few questions for me after that.” To say that Mari hadn’t made a good first impression on the rest of the room with those words was probably an understatement, though looking across the table it seemed like uncertainty was still the first word on Riko’s mind, while Dia just looked even more irritated than she’d been before.

“So nice of you to finally join us,” she chided.

“Thank you, I thought so too!” Mari replied, beaming as she leaned forward across the table, stretching a hand out towards her- one that Dia declined to shake. “You must be Kurosawa-san, is that correct?” A beat passed there while Dia just stared back at Mari, blinking once before she answered.

“That is.”

“Which would make _you_ ,” Mari went on, withdrawing her hand once she realized she wasn’t going to be getting the shake she was looking for, and turning her attention over towards Riko instead. “Sakurauchi-san, yes?”

“Not yet, legally,” Riko replied, before stealing another glance down the table, in Chika’s direction. “I still have her name.”

“Right, right. Well, we’ll get that sorted out soon enough,” Mari hummed, finally sitting down in a chair next to Chika and popping open her briefcase. “Now then, what sorts of things are we looking at here?” Mari asked. “No children, right? So no custody to worry about. And alimony isn’t on the table either, is that correct?”

“That’s r-” Riko started to say, before Dia raised a hand to silence her.

“I’ll handle this,” she assured Riko, still staring Mari down as she spoke. “That’s correct,” she went on. “The main thing we’re concerned about is the division of assets. Bank accounts, house, personal belongings, the likes.”

“Mhmm, mhmm, I see,” Mari replied, taking a moment to glance down intently at some of the papers in her briefcase- papers that, Chika would be able to see from where she was sitting, were entirely blank. It was all about appearances. “Well, that shouldn’t be so hard, should it?” she asked, before glancing between Chika and Riko. “This seems amicable enough, judging from the fact that you’re both sitting in the same room right now and nobody’s having to hold either of you back. And when we spoke earlier,” she went on, looking towards Chika now, “there weren’t any nasty names like ‘cheating whore’ or ‘backstabbing slut’ or ‘lustful jezebel.’ So I figure we can get this whole thing banged out in a half-hour, yes?”

“Do you actually think this is going to be that simple?” Dia asked, eyebrows creasing down even more as she cut in. “We’re not just looking at splitting a bank account down the middle and calling it a day. Between the money and the house alone we’re looking at upwards of three-million yen worth of assets. It’s going to take time to distribute this fairly.”

“Is it?” Mari asked, before glancing down the table towards Riko, rather than at Dia. “Riko-chan- Can I call you Riko-chan?” she asked, before continuing on without waiting for an answer. “Tell me, Riko-chan, do you hate my client?” she said, gesturing towards Chika. Riko looked understandably startled by that question, though as she opened her mouth to speak Dia was quickly raising a hand to cut her off again.

“You don’t need to answer that,” she said.

“Good heavens, Kurosawa-san,” Mari scoffed, rolling her eyes at Dia’s reaction. “What part of that do you think is going to be incriminating? It’s a simple personal question.” Still, Riko didn’t answer right away, instead looking over towards Dia. A moment passed before Dia glanced back at her, and then, with a small sigh, shut her eyes and nodded her head.

“Very well,” she said. “Go ahead.”

“I don’t hate her,” Riko answered, shaking her head. “We just… Don’t love each other anymore.”

“Do you agree with that, Chika-chan?” Mari asked, looking over towards her own client now. “Do you think Riko-chan is giving a fair assessment of the decline of your marriage?” That time it was Chika who took a moment to answer, and her expression was still stern, while her arms remained crossed over her chest. After a few seconds, though, she nodded, looking back across the table towards Riko as she spoke.

“Yeah,” she agreed. “We don’t have to make this messy.”

“You see, Dia-chan?”

“Kurosawa-san,” Dia corrected.

“Ohhhh, still insisting on being formal?” Mari giggled. “I thought I’d just made my case rather nicely, but so be it. Do you see, _Kurosawa-san_?” she asked. “Both our clients don’t see any reason to make this more complicated than it needs to be, so I say we just split everything down the middle, nice and easy, and call it a day.”

“And the house?” Dia replied. “How do you expect to split a house down the middle?”

“With a very large saw,” Mari replied, flashing a grin that Dia didn’t seem to appreciate in the slightest. “From what I saw, though, it’s a large house, right? Two floors, guest bedroom, two full bathrooms, the like? Is that correct?” she asked, looking at Chika, who gave her a nod in return. “A house that large… I can’t imagine either of you will be wanting to live there alone after the divorce anyway, right? It would just be big and lonely, and would have all those nasty little unpleasant memories tied up in it as well. So!” she went on, clapping her hands together. “I say we bring in a third-party real-estate agent, sell the house, and split the money fifty-fifty between them. Does that sound fair to everyone?” As Mari asked that question she looked across the table to see if Riko would approve, though as was becoming typical now, Dia was interrupting Riko before she had the chance to say anything herself.

“And how should I trust that you’ll find an unbiased realtor?” she asked. “How do I know you won’t try to screw us with that?”

“What do you think I’m going to do, Kurosawa-san, give the house away for twenty yen just to spite you? I would be screwing Chika-chan over as well if I did that,” she said, reaching out to pat her client on the back, and fortunately Chika didn’t seem to mind. “You have my word I’ll pick a good agent and get the best deal possible, scout’s honor.”

“Scout’s honor doesn’t mean a damn thing,” Dia replied. “I have no reason to just take your word for this.”

“No, it’s- It’s alright,” Riko interrupted, causing a look of great surprise to appear on Dia’s face. “I trust her. And it feels like a fair solution.”

“You see, Kurosawa-san?” Mari said, not quite able to suppress the grin on her face as she looked back towards Dia. “It’s a win-win situation, everyone’s happy. I’ll even let you meet the agent in person before we get going,” she added on, looking over towards Riko again. “Just to make sure you trust them.”

“I would appreciate that.”

“So that covers the house and the finances,” Mari said, glancing back down at a few of the papers in front of her once again. “Is there anything else we need to get sorted?”

“Personal effects,” Dia said. “Any jointly owned items of value. Cars, electronics, heirlooms, the likes.”

“We don’t have a car,” Riko said.

“And I don’t want the TV anyway,” Chika added on. “It’s too bright.”

“I’ve shown you how to change that.”

“But it always resets itself!” Chika huffed. “It’s not worth the trouble.”

“You two are just making this so easy on us!” Mari hummed. “Sell the house, split the money, and let these two sort out personal belongings between themselves. Does that sound like a reasonable solution to everyone?”

“Hang on,” Dia interrupted. “You can’t expect it to actually be that easy. There might be disagreements or disputes about what should go to who.”

“And if that situation arises we can come back here and sort through it on a case-by-case basis,” Mari said. “But until then I don’t see a reason to stick around here and make a tedious list of every single item they own if they’re not even going to fight over it in the first place.”

“Are you always this unprofessional?” Dia snapped, though Mari just grinned back at her, before glancing up towards the wall clock again.

“Unprofessional?” she replied. “I just mediated an entire divorce in about… six minutes. No thanks to you, I might add. Tell me, does that sound unprofessional in your eyes?”

“You didn’t _mediate_ anything. You just proposed a series of paper-thin half-measures that won’t hold up to the slightest bit of conflict or disagreement.”

“Maybe so, but I don’t think they need to,” Mari said, before looking down the table at Riko again. “Riko-chan, are you content with everything we’ve discussed here today?” As Mari asked that Dia looked over towards Riko as well, and Riko almost seemed intimidated by her icy stare. After a second or two, though, she looked towards Mari again, then gave a small nod.

“I am,” she said.

“And what about you, Chika-chan?” Mari asked, looking over towards her own client. “Does this all feel fair to you?”

“It does,” Chika replied.

“Well then, I think we’re done here for today,” Mari concluded. “Kurosawa-san and I can draft up the paperwork to make everything we’ve just talked about official, and then we’ll have to get you in here one more time before the court date to sign everything and make it binding, and that should be that. Thanks for coming, and stay safe on your way home!” Both Chika and Riko looked surprised by the fact that they were being dismissed after being here for such a short time, but after a few seconds of awkwardly staring back and forth around the room they finally stood up from their chairs, gathering their belongings as they did so. Dia, meanwhile, was still seething in her own chair, glaring daggers at Mari from across the room, and Mari still hadn’t made to gather her own documents again as she looked back at her.

“Kurosawa-san,” she said. “Could you stick around for a minute? I’d like to have a word with you.”

“I would like nothing more,” Dia replied, glaring at Mari through narrowed eyes. They both watched Riko and Chika make their way towards the door and leave the room, and the moment they were gone Mari was standing up from her chair, strolling towards Dia’s side of the table.

“I have to say, this is quite the first meeting,” she said. “You make a strong opening impression.”

“Cut the bullshit, Mari,” Dia said, slamming her own hands against the table as she rose up from her chair. “I’m not playing along with your little stranger fantasy.”

“Oh no?” Mari replied, quirking an eyebrow as she approached Dia. “You seemed perfectly content to go along with it while the others were around.”

“Only to avoid making the meeting awkward,” Dia replied. “But of course I should have known you would have no such reservation. And you evidently had no qualms about embarrassing me in front of my client either.”

“Embarrassing you?” Mari repeated. “It’s not my fault I’m better at this than you. Then again,” she chuckled, lips curling up into a playful smirk. “I guess you already learned that when I took the house and both cars and the dog and you just got… What was it? A few family heirlooms and some money for a cab to your hotel?”

“I took one and a half million yen from you,” Dia growled back, though Mari just laughed at that.

“Believe me, darling, if you knew how much I was worth that’s not a number you would be bragging about.”

“What about our friends? Kanan? Should I brag about winning her?”

“Ah, yes, how _is_ Kanan?” Mari asked. “Have you actually made a single move on her yet? Or are you still too busy focusing on your career and pining over your ex-wife?”

“I’m not pining over you,” Dia snapped.

“No, I suppose not,” Mari agreed, finally walking close enough that she could grab Dia by the tie and yank her forward, causing Dia’s face to turn bright red as she did so. “You’re not really doing much of anything _over_ me. _In_ me would be a more accurate word, wouldn’t it?” And then she was pulling Dia the rest of the way towards her to forcefully jam their lips together, sending both of them falling backwards onto the surface of the conference table.


End file.
